1. Technical Field
The invention relates to management of a computer network. More particularly, the invention relates to the use of a statistical data inspector in connection with the management of a computer network.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Relevance based computing is disclosed, for example, in Donoho, D. et al, Relevance clause for computed relevance messaging, U.S. Pat. No. 7,277,919 (issued Oct. 2, 2007). In such system: “a collection of computers and associated communications infrastructure to offer a new communications process . . . allows information providers to broadcast information to a population of information consumers. The information may be targeted to those consumers who have a precisely formulated need for the information. This targeting may be based on information which is inaccessible to other communications protocols. The targeting also includes a time element. Information can be brought to the attention of the consumer precisely when it has become applicable, which may occur immediately upon receipt of the message, but may also occur long after the message arrives. The communications process may operate without intruding on consumers who do not exhibit the precisely-specified need for the information, and it may operate without compromising the security or privacy of the consumers who participate.” (Abstract)
There are many measurements that can be made in an operational environment, such as an environment based upon relevance based messaging, as discussed above, to understand for example how systems are being used or to modify or manage such systems. Such characteristics can be things such as: When was the last time a user logged in? When was the last time a particular application ran? How often is it run? A number of measurements can thus be made in such environment and then captured to observe trends. Such trends allow an IT manager to plan and adjust usage, for example. In the case of applications, companies have legal obligations to pay for software or pay for services. They need to monitor how many people are using the software. Another area of interest is power management. Thus, there are many reasons why people want to measure the frequency of use of various things in a network.
One network architecture that embodies such relevance based messaging system is the BigFix Enterprise Suite™ (“BES”; BigFix, Inc., Emeryville, Calif.), which brings endpoints in such system under management by installing a native agent on each endpoint. Such agents are capable of collecting enormous amounts of data, but managing, storing, and processing such data is currently problematic.
It would be advantageous to provide a technique that allowed the collection, storage, and manipulation of data collected in a computer network.